


So quick bright things come to confusion

by ciaan



Series: Such Shaping Fantasies (dream-Kon) [3]
Category: DCU, Smallville
Genre: Gen, Parents & Children, Post-Rift
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-01
Updated: 2012-10-01
Packaged: 2017-11-15 10:46:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/526450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ciaan/pseuds/ciaan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clark goes to investigate this Superboy and his relation to Lex.</p>
            </blockquote>





	So quick bright things come to confusion

**Author's Note:**

> Based on S1-S3 of SV.

Or, if there were a sympathy in choice,  
War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it,  
Making it momentary as a sound,  
Swift as a shadow, short as any dream;  
Brief as the lightning in the collied night,  
That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth,  
And ere a man hath power to say 'Behold!'  
The jaws of darkness do devour it up:  
So quick bright things come to confusion.

-Shakespeare, _A Midsummer Night's Dream_

 

_**Around Town** _

_Local billionaire businessman **Lex Luthor** was spotted at the upscale restaurant **Le Rêve Épicurien** dining in the company of a teenage boy whom he introduced to the maitre d' as his son. Twice divorced with no heir this comes as quite a shock, though maybe it shouldn't given the number of women this famous playboy has been seen with around town, especially if you go back about fifteen or sixteen years in the Lifestyle section of this paper. No details have been forthcoming, but if you want to date Metropolis's most eligible bachelor, ladies and gentlemen, from now on you might need to be prepared to be a step-parent._

Clark stared at the page in front of him. "Hey, Smallville, look what Cat just filed!" Lois had bellowed across the room before marching over and waving it under his nose. It wasn't just the thought of Lex with a son that had him frozen, though. It was the blurry picture next to the snarky paragraph, clearly taken with someone's cell phone at the next table over, that showed the back of Lex's very distinctive head and the boy sitting with him. The boy Clark had seen yesterday in the park.

The boy who had been flying. The boy who claimed his name and symbol. The boy who looked like him.

With Lex?

It made no sense. Clark needed to get to the bottom of it.

"I always thought and hoped that he might be sterile," Lois continued. "Know what I mean?" Clark nodded vaguely without really paying attention as she kept on. The thoughts whirled through his head all morning, the possibilities too endless to even be considered and pictured. Around noon he managed to break from his desk and meetings and headed over to LuthorCorp Tower.

He was on a list at reception and signing in there always got him a visitor's pass. But when he reached the outer office of Lex's suite on the upper floor the aide informed him that, "Mr. Luthor is in a meeting, Mr. Kent."

She was lying to his face. He could hear Lex's heartbeat alone in the room. "Do you know when he'll be available?"

"He's very busy right now," she replied. "He has meetings booked all day."

Clark asked her to tell Lex that he had dropped by, thanked her, and left. Maybe this was for the best. He hadn't thought it through, had just headed over here in shock to talk to Lex. But Clark didn't really have much reason to chat with Lex about an unexpected son, not anymore, except to grill him as a reporter, and why would Lex grant him an interview now?

It was Superman who had met the boy before. It was Superman who ought to be asking about his powers.

Clark had never been sure if Lex knew he was Superman. At first he had figured that Lex must, but as the years went by and Lex didn't say anything about it, he started to hope that Lex didn't know. Lex always treated Superman as Superman and never spoke to him as Clark, and he always treated Clark as Clark and never spoke to him as Superman.

Not that they saw each other much. He hadn't been friends with Lex for ages, if they had ever really been friends and Lex hadn't just been investigating him. They saw each other around town sometimes and at LuthorCorp press conferences. As Superman he tried to keep Lex on the straight and narrow, investigating his research and experiments, but even though he lectured a lot he had to admit Lex never did anything really illegal or cruel. He'd saved Lex from a few criminals and villains, too.

He was changed and hovering outside Lex's window all too soon, still unsure what to say. Lex was reading over some documents. He glanced up, saw Clark, stared blankly at him for an instant, then went back to reading. Clark moved a little closer to the window. After a few more minutes of reading Lex closed the folder on his desk and opened the wide glass panes with a remote control. Clark settled down in the middle of the lush carpet and crossed his arms over his chest.

"Superman," Lex stated coolly. "To what do I owe the honor of this visit? Would you like a drink?" Clark noticed then that Lex had a tumbler of scotch on the desk. Lex had cut back on his drinking a lot after his father died. This wasn't a good sign.

"It's barely after noon," he replied, annoyed at himself for being annoyed by Lex so quickly.

"Don't worry. I poured this at 12:01pm on the dot." Lex raised the amber glass in a salute and took a sip. Clark had nothing to say to that, fuming at the light tone of Lex's voice. The silence stretched on for a long moment and Lex's right eyebrow started slowly ticking upward into a delicate, sarcastic arch. Clark still hadn't explained his presence or said anything he wanted to say.

"I hear you have… That you've found… Congratulations on… your son?"

"Thank you." Lex's tone and expression were impossible to read now.

"Is he really your son?"

Lex actually smiled at that, a sharp smile. "Weren't you just passing out teddy bears at the orphanage last week? You should know to be more considerate and precise in your terminology."

And these were the moments Clark hated, when he couldn’t tell if Lex was hinting at Clark being adopted, or not. Lex was always so cold and distant. Aggressive in a subtle, polite fashion that Clark couldn't point out without looking like a paranoid jerk, or giving away his secrets, and couldn't ever match. He felt like a bumbling idiot if he tried.

Not grinding his teeth, he amended, "Biological son."

"Which is any of your business because…?" That was exactly what the boy had said.

"He doesn't look like you."

Lex brushed his hand back over his head, long fingers shaping the elegant curve of his bare scalp. "You've seen at least a few of my paramours, Superman. Even you must have noticed that I have a type."

It was true, Lex did tend to favor tall brunettes with stunning cheekbones. Clark could imagine the boy having a mother like that. And he didn't entirely not look like Lex; there were the brilliant blue eyes. His general build. Maybe his mouth, though Lex's scar made that harder to pin down.

Except. He looked a lot like Clark. And he could fly.

"He can fly."

"Last time I checked there was no law stating that you were the only person allowed to fly in Metropolis."

Yes, the boy had certainly sounded like Lex when they talked. What was worrying Clark the most, though, as much as the question of where the boy had come from, was the way he had mentioned his dad. Lex. Said Clark had never told him, said Clark rubbed his face in it. As if Lex did know. As if Clark had a secret identity just to spite Lex. That wasn't true at all.

He needed to figure out what was going on, without compromising his secret after all this time, if it was secret. He didn't know how to do this.

"He was wearing an S-shield t-shirt."

Lex just nodded coolly at that.

"He called himself Superboy."

"Did he? So, should I ground him... withhold his allowance... send him to bed without supper...?" Lex placed his palms on either side of his glass and moved them back and forth, twisting and twirling it slightly.

Lex was giving him nothing. Making Clark come out and say it. "He looks like me. And I know you've done experiments with cloning technology before…"

That earned him another raised eyebrow. "And how would I have gotten whatever passes for your DNA?" Lex took a dramatically large sip of scotch. "Considering that you are invulnerable. Did I sneak a cheek swab somehow? Is that maybe why I offered you a drink?"

Clark was pretty sure he was blushing as much from annoyance as embarrassment. "I don't know."

Lex stared straight at him. "I can assure you," he continued, "I didn't clone you. My son just… happened. As children sometimes do. A blessing that finds us, you know?" His tone was bland but with a knife-edge underneath. Pretty much the most blatant hint he had ever made, yet not an admission of anything. And Clark still didn't know what was going on here. Was Lex lying about the cloning? Was it possible another Kryptonian had survived and reached Earth somehow? Or what? Then Lex sighed and gestured at his desk. "Now, if you have nothing more to say to me, I'm very busy."

Clark didn't have anything more to say to him. He wasn't going to trade info for info. He turned to go.

"And, Superman," came Lex's last quiet statement as Clark lifted up and flew out the window, "I trust you will appreciate the need for discretion regarding my son's abilities rather than making them public knowledge."

Well, Lex had certainly won that round.


End file.
